In Luck at Last eBook

This is a sound which to some ears is more delightful
than the finest music in the world. It awakens
all the most pleasurable emotions; it provokes desire
and hankering after possession; and it fills the soul
with the imaginary enjoyment of wealth.

“Certainly not,” said Mr. Chalker, confident
that better terms than those would be offered.
“If that is all you have to say, you may go
away again.”

“But the rest is usury. Think! To
give fifty, and ask three hundred and fifty, is the
part of an usurer.”

“Call it what you please. The bill of sale
is for three hundred and fifty pounds. Pay that
three hundred and fifty, with costs and sheriff’s
poundage, and I take away my man. If you don’t
pay it, then the books on the shelves and the furniture
of the house go to the hammer.”

“The books, I am informed,” said Lala
Roy, “will not bring as much as a hundred pounds
if they are sold at auction. As for the furniture,
some of it is mine, and some belongs to Mr. Emblem’s
granddaughter.”

“His granddaughter! Oh, it’s a swindle,”
said Mr. Chalker angrily. “It is nothing
more or less than a rank swindle. The old man
ought to be prosecuted, and, mind you, I’ll
prosecute him, and you too, for conspiring with him.”

“A prosecution,” said the Hindoo, “will
not hurt him, but it might hurt you. For it would
show how you lent him fifty pounds five years ago;
how you made him give you a bill for a hundred; how
you did not press him to pay that bill, but you continually
offered to renew it for him, increasing the amount
on each time of renewal; and at last you made him
give you a bill of sale for three hundred and fifty.
This is, I suppose, one of the many ways in which
Englishmen grow rich. There are also usurers
in India, but they do not, in my country, call themselves
lawyers. A prosecution. My friend, it is
for us to prosecute. Shall we show that you have
done the same thing with many others? You are,
by this time, well known in the neighborhood, Mr.
Chalker, and you are so much beloved that there are
many who would be delighted to relate their experiences
and dealings with so clever a man. Have you ever
studied, one asks with wonder, the Precepts of the
great Sage who founded your religion?”

“Oh, come, don’t let us have any religious
nonsense!”

“I assure you they are worth studying.
I am, myself, an humble follower of Gautama, but I
have read those precepts with profit. In the
kingdom imagined by that preacher, there is no room
for usurers, Mr. Chalker. Where, then, will be
your kingdom? Every man must be somewhere.
You must have a kingdom and a king.”

“This is tomfoolery!” Mr. Chalker turned
red, and looked very uncomfortable. “Stick
to business. Payment in full. Those are my
terms.”

“You think, then, that the Precepts of your
Sage are only intended for men while they sit in the
church? Many Englishmen think so, I have observed.”